Recently I’ve started writing about Wealth Masters International and one thing I’ve noticed in particular about this MLM company is that they’ve got an exhaustive list of policies members must adhere to.

One particular list is their Advertising policies which outlines 9 extensive rules WMI members must comply with when promoting their business.

In designing their advertising policies, Wealth Masters International admits that it has no confidence in its own members advertising ability.

WMI requires that all members ‘must use the sales aids and support materials produced by WMI‘ because if WMI members were allowed to come up with their own advertising, ‘the likelihood that they would unintentionally violate any number of statutes or regulations affecting a WMI business is almost certain.‘

In other words, those looking to join WMI would inevitably wind up breaking the law if they were given permission to advertise freely.

It’s not usually a good sign when a company admits the type of people it’s looking to recruit are almost certainly going to break the law if allowed to think for themselves.

Infact, as far as marketing goes, WMI practically prohibits its members from any type of independent thinking. WMI members

must not produce their own literature, advertisements, sales aids and promotional materials, or Internet web pages.

This from a company that claims to ‘empower individuals to create success on their own terms and achieve true freedom in all areas of their lives.’

Yes, you can have your empowerment and true freedom… just not when it comes to advertising our company.

Today I thought I’d provide a further  analysis of the 9 policies WMI use to regulate company advertising and investigate how strictly the company is enforcing them.

With such strong claims and clauses laid out in the opening paragraphs of the advertising policies, one would think the adherence and compliance with them would be a good indication of how WMI is run as a greater company.

Let’s find out. [Continue reading…]

Following the Bank Of Namibia’s claims that TVI Express is an illegal pyramid scheme, members of TVI Express lawyered up and rolled out threats of a class action lawsuit unless the bank met their demands.

Through their lawyers, Metcalfe Attorneys, members of TVI Express demanded that the bank meet with them and retract their public warning.

In response to these demands, the Bank of Namibia again put out another public warning reminding Namibians of the possible N$1,000,000 ($145,000 AUD) fine or 10 year imprisonment penalty for promoting TVI Express.

Following this second public warning, members of TVI Express have since come out with what they believe is a rock solid defense. Instead of addressing the TVI Express business model, explaining or analysing it – TVI express members are claiming the bank of Namibia has no ‘jurisdiction over them‘.

Why?

Because apparently all members of TVI Express operate as sole traders. [Continue reading…]

Late last week the Bank of Namibia warned Namibians against participating in TVI Express. The bank claimed that TVI Express was nothing more then a pyramid scheme and stated that

in the whole, selling of purported products or services is a small component of the business models in the scheme and therefore designed to defraud members of the public.

The business operations of the scheme places substantial emphasis on recruitment of participants. In this respect, the scheme offers lucrative incentives to the participants, calculated primarily on the basis of the number of participants or members they recruited into the scheme.

Obviously not happy about the public warning, TVI Express today unleashed it’s lawyers upon the Bank of Namibia in the form of a strongly worded letter.

The gist of it?

‘Meet up with us, retract your ridiculous accusations or we’re coming after you with a class action law suit’. [Continue reading…]

Over the past year or so I’ve written a number of articles on Liberty League International, then Polaris Media Group, then Polaris Global Marketing and now simply Polaris Global.

Over the course of these articles many people have been written about and discussed, all within the context of the MLM industry of course. Some of the people I’ve written about are still with Polaris Global and some have moved on.

One of the people written about was Cassandra Rigbye and she’s not too happy about being mentioned in an article. Yesterday afternoon I received the following email; [Continue reading…]

Ah Africa, home of blood diamonds, daily mass rapes, guerrilla warfare, theft, car hijackings and of course the largest internet scam industry on the planet.

Anyone who’s been on the internet for more then ten minutes has undoubtedly come across a 419 scam email from someone claiming to want to export riches from somewhere in Africa. The catch? You need to send them money first.

Yes, there’s entire offices of people sending out these emails every day in the same manner that people would work a 9-5 job. Meanwhile the authorities haven’t really done much over the last two decades to combat any of the crimes being committed.

Taking all the crime that happens in Africa into consideration, you know you’ve got real problems then if Africa starts claiming your business is an ‘illegal scheme‘.

Enter TVI Express. [Continue reading…]

Once upon a time there was an MLM company who marketed coffee designed to help you perform better in the bedroom.

Magic Power Coffee claimed to be an all natural alternative to synthetic drugs on the market like Viagra and Cialis. All was well and Magic Power Coffee grew as an MLM company… well, until the FDA got involved.

Following an analysis of Magic Power Coffee’s product sometime during May or June this year, the FDA slammed Magic Power Coffee over it’s claims of offering a ‘100% natural sex enhancement product‘.

The FDA’s analysis revealed that Magic Power Coffee contained something called ‘hydroxythiohomosildenafil’.

For those of you not in the pharmaceutical industry, hydroxythiohomosildenafil is similar to sildenafil – which is the active ingredient in Viagra. So it turned out Magic Power Coffee was literally nothing more then coffee + Viagra.

The FDA put out a public health warning resulting in Magic Power Coffee and its parent company, INZ Distributors put out a voluntary recall on all stock manufactured up to the 5th August.

Fast forward a few months and now it seems Magic Power Coffee is trying to relaunch themselves as Magic Power Drink.

They’ve dropped the coffee and presumably gotten rid of hydroxythiohomosildenafil… but thankfully the marketing is still just as cheesy as ever. [Continue reading…]

Wealth. It’s something that most of us strive for in our lives and can be earnt in a variety of ways. Some people derive wealth from a steady income, some work on a commission whereas others run their own businesses.

Regardless of how you accumulate it, ask most people and they’ll tell you that wealth is an integral component of their life plans. Therefore the value of wealth goes without saying.

Given this desire to accumulate wealth in most of us, it sort of makes sense that there’s a market out there to teach people how to not only accumulate wealth but also how to preserve and make the most of what they make.

Wealth Masters International are one such company that combine MLM along with a vision to ‘empower individuals to create success on their own terms and achieve true freedom in all areas of their lives.’

Now as far as visions go, that’s a pretty broad and high reaching aim to strive for. Wealth Masters International (WMI) have set themselves some pretty high goals and the burning question of course is: do they deliver?

Let’s find out. [Continue reading…]

As you become familiar with anything in life it’s all too easy to begin to forget that not everyone you encounter might have as an indepth a knowledge level as you.

Time and time again in life you’re going to find yourself having to explain something, be it a concept, mechanic or an entire overview of something they don’t nearly have as much experience with as yourself.

If you’re in the MLM industry, then one of these things could very easily be network marketing. From the very moment you start searching for leads, it’s important to be mindful of the fact that not everyone knows how MLM works or what’s involved in network marketing.

Let alone the intricacies between compensation plans, companies that use hybrid models or what it takes to be successful in MLM.

Last week Alexandra Cain, writing for the Age blog ‘Savvy Investor’, provided some insight into the mindset of someone who isn’t MLM savvy, when they are exposed to the increasingly elusive marketing campaigns used to market MLM opportunities today. [Continue reading…]

A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent’s position.

To “attack a straw man” is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the “straw man”), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.

-Wikipedia definition of a “strawman argument”

For some reason, when you criticise the compensation plan of TVI Express and the fact that its members are not awarded any commissions based on the use of TVI’s product, members of TVI Express interpret this as ‘TVI Express’ product does not work’.

Given that this is not the argument presented to them about why TVI Express is nothing more then a money game pyramid scheme, it’s accurate to label their retorts as strawman arguments.

Despite the ineffectiveness of countering an argument with an irrelevant rebuttal, recently NSW based TVI Express member Jack Panaghis decided to record a video of himself redeeming one of TVI Express’ travel vouchers; [Continue reading…]

There’s no hiding the fact that Facebook is the largest social media network in the world today.

Ranked #2 for global internet traffic and with a membership now of over 500 million, that’s a huge network that is no doubt the envy of every internet marketer out there.

Naturally the success of Facebook has resulted in many competitors trying to emulate the success of the social giant over the years but thus far none have prevailed.

One of those competitors is MLM startup YourNight, who appear to be the first to partner social networking with an MLM income opportunity.

Social networking with an MLM compensation plan? Hmm…how’s that work? [Continue reading…]